To End In Fire
by Aceofshadows
Summary: The waters in the ocean of life are fickle, and their flow is easily changed. Many times, a decision makes but a ripple, which quickly fades to nothingness. When Harry and Hermione enter the sleepy town of Godric's Hollow by another road, the tiny ripple created by this innocuous choice will become a tidal wave. (Currently T, rated M to avoid bait and switch with later content)


To End in Fire

 _By Aceofshadows214_

 _ **DISCLAIMER** **:**_

 _The world and characters of Harry Potter belong to She-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named, who is not me. I get nothing from this but enjoyment.  
_

Chapter 1:

o-/== IIII ==\\-o

The mood at the world headquarters of the Snake-faced Bastard Eradication Society was tense. Even that name, as Ron had jokingly dubbed the little wizarding tent the three called home, rubbed raw wounds. Ron was gone, months of hardship, danger, scant food, and Horcrux-induced mood swings finally culminating in a violent argument with Harry. With spellfire between the two only prevented by Hermione's timely shield charm, he walked right out the door, through the wards, and disapparated. That was last month.

Harry was sitting crosslegged outside the open tent door, idly feeding twigs into a small fire. To his right, Hermione Granger, the brightest witch of the age, lounged listlessly against a tree, hugging her knees to her chest and trying, with great effort and marginal success, to avoid crying. Days that stretched into weeks had done nothing to dull the pain of his rejection, and the green and gold locket around her neck wasn't doing anything to help her willpower. A stick snapped in the woods, and she jerked her head up. Harry's eyes followed hers with the same intent, hoping desperately for a flash of red hair through the trees. Only grey bark and dead leaves greeted their eyes.

With a sigh that sounded suspiciously like "Oh, Ron," she put her head back down. Harry sat, watching the woods, for a little longer, before he too gave up. This little ritual of watching the woods at every sound, the tiny pinprick of hope they allowed themselves at every snapped twig, had become one of the few things keeping them from falling into total disrepair in the last few weeks. Now, even it was losing its magic. As he turned back to his friend, a strange, yet all-too-familiar pained feeling settled in his chest. She was crying silently, a silvery tear slipping unbidden down her cheek. The sight never failed to sober him up, no matter how far gone his mental state was. He'd spent a lot of time sober since Ron left.

He moved to her side, and gently brushed the hair from the back of her neck, revealing the locket clasp. "You've had that long enough for now, I think."

Teary eyes looked up, focused somewhere not quite on Harry's person. "Harry, it's not your turn yet, I made a schedule for this! I still have twenty minutes left!"

"Hermione." His voice was calm, gentle, yet firm. "Please."

Her eyes stopped examining a point in space a few inches in front of his chin and focused on his for several moments, before she nodded slowly, and held her hair out of the way, allowing Harry to undo the clasp.

A putrid, crawling, blanket of energy washed over him as the cold weight of the locket came to rest against his chest. It didn't matter how many times he put the blasted thing on, it always made him shudder. It felt so _wrong_. The aura of listlessness, resentment towards Ron, and general malcontent settled over him like an old friend as he finished with the clasp, and drew his wand. "I'm going to go check the wards. I'll be back soon." Her murmured assent in his ears, he began his patrol. Over the months, this had become his favorite way to clear his head. Even with the space expansion charms, the tent was still small, and with the oppressive dank of the horcrux over one of the three at any given time, the mood was either charged with tension, or artificially lightened by forced levity. The crisp autumn air and the solitude along the ward lines always brought a measure of peace, even while wearing the locket.

After confirming that the wards were at full strength, he made his way back to the tent. As he drew near, he saw that Hermione was leaning back against the tree reading a thick tome of some sort. He paused for a moment to study her facial expressions, searching for signs that she was back to some semblance of normal behavior. Eyes dry and focused intently on the book, check. Gently chewing on bottom lip, check. Strands of bushy hair falling in front of her face, one string idly twirled around her finger, check. Harry let a smile play across his face. _Crisis averted_ , he thought.

He resumed his walk back, intentionally making noisy steps in an attempt not to startle her. He and Ron had learned early on that you interrupted Hermione's reading at your own peril. They used to joke, well out of her hearing, of course, that if Voldemort apparated behind her while she was reading _Hogwarts, a History_ , the war would be over in a matter of seconds. His ploy was successful, as she glanced up before he entered the danger zone. "Wards okay?" she inquired in the slightly distracted tone that signified deep engrossment in her reading.

"Yeah, still going strong. No gaps." She nodded, and returned full attention to her book. Harry sighed, and knelt in front of her. Gently, carefully, he flipped the bookmark into the fold between the pages, took hold of the corners of the book, and closed it. He tensed as her head snapped up, and their eyes met. _Thank Merlin. The "I'm irritated" face, not the "HARRY JAMES POTTER" face. I live another day._ "Hermione, we need to do _something_. We aren't making any progress in the hunt. If we just keep sitting here, this locket is going to get further inside our heads, and we're going to alternate going at each other's throats until we snap." Her chest heaved with an exhausted sigh, and she set the book on the ground.

"I know that, Harry... I just don't know what to do," she admitted, with an edge of desperation in her voice. "There's nothing in any of these books, nothing in the things Dumbledore left us, nothing in anything we've found. We don't have anything to go on, we're nearly out of food, our best friend has abandoned us, our other friends are suffering and dying every day! Plus, we've got a piece of You-Know-Who's soul trying its best to drive us insane. We don't have any way of destroying anything we find, either. Did I miss anything?" she asked bitterly. Harry didn't say anything. Even if she was being a little cynical, she was right. The lazy trickle of the stream nearby was the only thing that broke the silence of the moment before she spoke again.

"Sometimes, when it gets to be the hardest, I find myself wondering why we're doing this. Why _we're_ the ones wandering around England hunting for pieces of some evil bastard's soul. We shouldn't be doing this, Harry. We should be sitting in a warm, cozy castle in Scotland, stressing over our N.E.W.T.S. We should be going on dates, and wondering whether the object of our affections returns them; going to Hogsmeade and drinking Butterbeer in the Three Broomsticks with our friends. It's almost Christmas, and we should be celebrating, buying presents, going caroling. Instead, we're sitting against trees and huddling around a tiny fire; the weight of the world on our shoulders." She was starting to cry again, chocolate brown eyes brimming with tears. "I lie there, and ask myself: why does it have to be us?"

He rested his back against another tree, and was silent for a minute before replying to her rhetorical question. "I have to be here because of the bloody prophecy. But, even if I didn't, I suspect I would be here anyway, for much the same reasons as you. We see the injustice: You-Know-Who killing our friends, people being judged by the contents of their veins, rather than the contents of their hearts, and we just can't sit back and let others fight our battles for us."

The soft gurgle of the creek rang loud in the small clearing for several minutes, Harry expecting no response to his confirmation of what she already knew. Hermione finally spoke in a subdued voice. "Running like this… it makes me realize how big the world is. Two people could get lost in it so easily. There have been times, more now that Ron's left, when I've been tempted to just run away. To find a forest like this somewhere, and forget about the war. Live, laugh, grow old. Every time I've thought of it, I've forced it back down, told myself to think of the others, of how unfair it would be to make them carry this burden. It's getting harder and harder to do, each time." She paused for a moment; Harry, sensing she wasn't done, remained silent. "I'm scared, Harry. Scared that a time will come when I won't be able to do this anymore. That I'll just throw that bloody locket in the woods and apparate away from it all."

"If that ever happens, I'll just make sure I'm carrying the locket," Harry grinned, before turning serious again. "That's what friends are for, Hermione. When we fall, we pick each other up. When we stumble, we help each other get our balance again." He stood up and offered Hermione his hand. "And right now, you look like you need a hand up." She blinked several times, staring at the hand, before accepting it and getting to her feet, riding Harry's assistance into one of her trademark bone-crushing hugs.

"Thanks, Harry."

He returned the hug in kind. "That's why I'm here." They held the hug for a minute, lost in thought, before separating. "While I was checking the wards, I had an idea of where we might go next."

"Well? Spit it out!" Hermione demanded eagerly. Harry cracked a grin. _And there she is, back from the dead._

"Godric's Hollow. We might get something out of Bathilda Bagshot, and…" he trailed off. Hermione, understanding instantly, laid a comforting hand on his shoulder.

"I agree. We'll need to hold off on it for a few days, though. The Death Eaters are probably watching your house. We need to prepare."

o-/== IIII ==\\-o

The next four days were spent obtaining hairs from several unsuspecting Muggles for polyjuice potion, and practicing apparating while under the invisibility cloak. Finally, on Christmas Eve, they felt ready. Covered by Harry's cloak, and disguised as villagers, they apparated into the outskirts of Godric's Hollow. Silently, they checked the area, then removed the cloak, and made their way into the village. Through the gently falling snow, strains of carols reached their ears; the few villagers they passed waved a cheery hello. The effect was like a scene from a postcard, the quintessential idyllic village at Christmas, given form. The comfortable silence of the falling snow brought a very welcome sense of peace to the two as they walked, content merely to draw comfort from each other's presence. At a cross between two roads, they came to an an abrupt halt. A shiny black obelisk carved with the names of villagers who had died in the World Wars shifted before their eyes into a statue. Specifically, a statue with a man standing protectively over a mother and a baby. A baby with a very familiar scar. "Merlin, Harry…" Hermione breathed.

Harry appeared not to hear her, but stood looking at the statue for a time. "Let's keep moving…" he finally managed. Hermione cast a worried glance at him, attempting to see if he was okay, and saw only a grim resolve on his face. Wordlessly, he led the way further along the road. As they approached the end, a ruined house resolved itself out of thin air. Harry's breath caught. Finally, this was it. A sign rose from the ground as they drew closer.

"It was on this spot, on the night of October 31th, 1981, that James and Lily Potter lost their lives to He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named. Their son, Harry, remains the only wizard to ever survive the killing curse. This house, invisible to Muggles, has been left in its ruined state as a monument to the Potters and as a reminder of the violence that tore apart their family," Hermione read aloud. No sooner had she stopped speaking, than words began to appear on the sign. Graffiti, in all sizes and colors. "They shouldn't write on the sign! Don't they have any…" She was about to launch into an indignant rant about how horrible it was to deface a sign like that, when she noticed what was written. The words of her diatribe died in her throat. Messages of praise, of thanksgiving, rendered in a thousand different hands, bubbled to the top, overlapping, vying for space and attention. _They will be remembered. We will not forget what you have done for us, Harry Potter. Good on you, Harry!_ And finally, in a simple, childlike scrawl: _Thank you._ Snow fell in silence as they stood there for eternal moments. Looking sadly at the house, Harry finally found voice.

"All they see is the place the war ended, the day their fears disappeared." A pause. "All I see is my parent's grave." He turned to Hermione, his expression wistful. "When we win… when he's finally gone… this is all they're going to see, isn't it? The triumphant heroes, the slayers of their demons. They'll never know about the days we spent fighting over where we should go next, the nights after Ron left when I stood watch, listening to you desperately trying not to cry." He turned back to the house, his voice bitter. "They won't care about the cost."

A thick dusting of snow had covered their shoulders by the time they turned away from the house to visit the graveyard. The wrought-iron kissing gate opened with a gentle creak, as they passed through into the the yard. Lamplight filtered through the stained glass windows of the adjoining church, casting flecks of color across the smooth white canvas of snow, broken only by the silent ranks of headstones. The faint echo of a hymn from the church was the only sound that profaned the stillness. After hastily erecting a ward to alert them to any intrusions, the pair split up to search the yard. As Harry was bending down to brush the snow from a headstone, Hermione called out in a hushed voice.

"Harry… I've found them." Trepidation filled his steps as he joined her before a large double tombstone. She had already brushed away the snow, revealing the inscription. Tears started to play at the corners of his eyes as he read. He had always known his parents were dead, but somehow, it hadn't seemed real, like one summer he was going to get off the Hogwarts Express and see them standing on the platform waiting for him, wide smiles on their faces. Seeing their gravestone shattered that faint, unspoken, hope into dust and slammed a vault door on it. They were dead. They weren't coming back. The pent-up stress of the past months slammed into him like a rampaging Hippogriff, and he collapsed sobbing into the snow. He barely registered Hermione holding him close, her head nuzzled into the crook of his neck, or her silent conjuring of a wreath of lilies at the foot of the tombstone. Seconds stretched into minutes, before the growing cold finally shook him out of his reverie.

"I need to get out of here," he choked out. With a nod and a gentle hug, Hermione threw the invisibility cloak over them both, and they began to make their way out of the graveyard, feeling that it would somehow cheapen the moment to simply apparate away from the graveside. As they drew around the side of a crypt towards the entrance, Hermione gave a start as the ward tripped, and the gate let out a creak. She quickly cast a privacy charm. "Harry, we need to go, now!" she whispered, frantically.

"Not yet, let's see who it is. It might give us an idea where to go next." Gingerly, so as not to disturb the snow and alert the intruder, they leaned around the crypt. A small figure in a black cloak knelt at the Potter family grave. With a well-practiced wand movement, Hermione surreptitiously cast an eavesdropping charm.

"It seems you were not forgotten this year, Lord and Lady Potter," a female voice murmured, as if in reflection. Reaching inside her cloak, she pulled out a wand and brought a woven wreath of white rosemary flowers to rest beside Hermione's lilies. "I thought you might be lonely. I do hate being alone at Christmas-time. I should have visited you sooner, your graveyard is quite lovely." She paused for a moment, before continuing with a slightly odd tone. "Although you really should get rid of the mistletoe on that tree, Nargles are hardly appropriate company in such a beautiful place."

If Harry or Hermione had been drinking at that moment, their spit-take would have been the stuff of legends. As it was, only the privacy charm kept Harry's astonished "Luna!?" or Hermione's equally audible shushing noise from giving their presence away. Unaware of the interruption, the figure, now unmistakably Luna, continued.

"You'd be proud of your son, Lily. Can I call you Lily? Thank you. Harry is doing great things. He started a group to train other students to fight last year, you know, when that horrible toad of a woman was 'teaching.'" Luna actually punctuated this comment with air quotes. "It's a lot of work, trying to fill his shoes. I'm not sure why people started using that expression, I would think shoes would be terribly difficult to put on if they were filled. Now, he's off doing something, somewhere, to end this war. I'm sorry I don't know what, exactly, but he didn't tell me. I don't blame him for that, it's probably very secret." A pause, then, in a small voice that would have been inaudible without magical aid, "It still hurts."

At a more normal volume, she continued. "He's a good man, too, Lily. The first person I could honestly call a friend, the only one who would give Loony Lovegood a second chance. And he has good friends with him, too, even if they do have frightful Wrackspurt infestations. I have faith in him, Lily, that he'll do what he's set out to do, simply because he has to. If the combined forces of Hell itself stood in his path, I'd feel quite sorry for them. That's the kind of man your son is, James." She rose, small patches of snow tumbling off her shoulders. "Many more are going to join you before this war is over, James and Lily Potter. If there is a god in your heaven, pray to him. We certainly need the help." She reached out, the pale skin of her hand shining in the moonlight, and drew two runes in the snow on top of the stone, before stepping back. "May you find the peace in death you were denied in life. Sleep well, young mother."

Slowly, she turned, and began an unhurried walk towards the gate, head bowed in reflection. As Harry watched her, something about her posture resonated with him. As she neared the gate, he realized with a start what it was. It was that almost imperceptible slump of the shoulders that he saw every time he looked in the mirror; the weight of responsibilities pressing down like the mythical burden of Atlas. Before he quite realized it, his feet were in motion, taking him out from under the cloak and beyond the silencing charm.

"Luna!" The call, low as it was, sounded impossibly loud in the silence of the church yard. The next thing Harry knew, he was lying on his back in the snow, with two worried witches leaning over him. "Uhh… what happened?" He looked to Hermione for an answer, only to be greeted with an icy countenance and danger-filled eyes. She cast a privacy charm. Before Harry could fully register the exact implications of this, Mount Granger erupted.

"What happened? What happened! You happened, Mr. Chosen One! You went and startled an emotionally distraught witch, at night, in a place where she thought she was totally alone! Be glad she went for the stunning hex, and not the _Reducto_ , or all those Boy-Who-Lived books would have been rendered ironically mistitled!" She continued on for a full minute, before finally registering that Harry Potter, Triwizard Champion, slayer of basilisks, was currently backed up as far as he could go against a tombstone, an expression of abject terror on his face. The pyroclastic flow fizzled out with an "And you should know better!" Deafening silence reigned.

"I've heard the expression 'turn the air blue' before, but I can't say I've ever seen it happen," Luna remarked thoughtfully. "Perhaps it only occurs when there is a large ambient concentration of Wrackspurts, you two do seem to have an unusually large amount of them." The others stared at her in consternation. "Oh, dear, was it something I said?" They blinked, owlishly, once, twice, before bursting out laughing, and wrapping her in a snow-dusted group hug.

"Merlin, we've missed you, Luna!" exclaimed Hermione, breaking the hug. "How is it at Hogwarts?"

Luna's face fell. "The students are quite unhappy. We shouldn't talk here, it isn't safe."

Harry nodded. "We can take you to our camp, if you want. How did you get here, anyway?"

"I came of age this year, and passed my apparition exam. The sensation is quite unpleasant, isn't it?" she inquired, prompting vigorous nods from the others. "I suppose you're wondering what I'm doing here, aren't you?" Her face took on a sad expression. "Father didn't want me to come home for the holidays this year, he said it was unsafe. He couldn't come this year, but every year we could, on Christmas Eve, we used to come here, and talk to your parents, Harry. Wish them a happy new year, give blessings of peace and protection. At first, when I was a little girl, there was quite the group, but over time, they stopped coming, until, the year before last, it was just Father and I." She cast a forlorn glance at the headstone. "The wizarding world seems to have forgotten them rather quickly, hasn't it?"

"Luna… I had no idea," Harry said, thickly, barely-caged emotion tinging his voice.

"There's no need for any of that, Harry Potter," she responded, with a more typical dreamy expression. "I am only doing what I wish someone would do for my mother."

An awkward silence fell, neither of the others knowing quite what to say after that, before Luna reminded them that they really should go. They managed to fit under the invisibility cloak with no small degree of difficulty, and exited the graveyard. As they prepared to apparate, Hermione caught Harry's arm. "Look at her!" she exclaimed. They followed her gaze, and beheld a desiccated old woman, wrapped in heavy shawls, seemingly looking straight at them. The crone raised an arthritic finger, and crooked it in their direction in a beckoning gesture. The trio turned their heads, thinking that she was summoning someone behind them, but the street was as empty as Ron's plate after dinner. "How can she see us… That's impossible…" Hermione voiced their collective thoughts in a whisper. The woman started to hobble off, pausing momentarily after a few steps to beckon them again. Harry started to follow her, only for Hermione to stop him. "Harry, it has to be a trap!"

"Or, it could be a creepy old woman who could help us figure out where to look! We don't have much to lose, Hermione!" They stared each other down for a tense moment, before Hermione let out a huff and relinquished her hold on him. The woman led them down the street, around a corner, and into a side alley that reminded Harry of the set from a B-grade horror movie the Dursleys had watched when he was around ten - not including him in their fun, of course. He'd had to watch through the barely-opened door of his cupboard.

At the end of this alley, a dilapidated house stood watch. Windows like black voids peppered the outside, ivy clung to the mouldering brick, and a single candle in a front window was the only indication that anything but roaches and ghosts called the structure home. She unlocked the door, her papery skin, spotted with age, standing in stark contrast to the blackening wood and peeling paint as she did so. With a silent motion, she ushered them into the front parlor, such as it was: merely a tiny space to stand amid the clutter of dusty books and faded pictures that graced nearly every level surface. Harry removed the cloak, and had to stifle a cough, as the rancid odor of disuse, mixed with the stink of stale food, filled his nostrils.

The crone's cataract-clouded eyes surveyed each of them intently in turn, lingering on Harry's scar. Abruptly, she turned, and shuffling steps took her through a door in the back, which closed behind her. Glancing at each other in bewilderment, they light a few of the candles laying around the room, then split up and began browsing through the books. It was Luna who found something of interest first. "Ooh, goody, our host is famous!" She held up a book, and brushed the dust off it, revealing the cover of _A History of Magic, by Bathilda Bagshot_. Flipping to the inside front cover, she pointed to a picture of a much younger Bathilda, along with a small numeral one, indicating that it was the first copy printed. Harry allowed himself a small grin, as a glance at Hermione confirmed his suspicions; she was all but salivating at the presence of a first edition copy of the venerable book. She practically snatched it from Luna's hands, and started leafing through it with a predatory glint in her eyes.

With Hermione missing in action, Harry and Luna resumed their perusal. As he spelled the dust away from an end table all but buried under dust and picture frames, a glint of gold caught his eye. Picking up the weighty silver frame, he stared right into the merry face of the golden-haired thief from Gregorovitch's wand shop, the same thief he had seen arm-in-arm with a young Dumbledore in Rita Skeeter's superlative piece of fiction, _The Life and Lies of Albus Dumbledore_. Driven by a fit of impulse, he clandestinely slipped the frame inside his coat, just before the beleaguered moan of a door hinge signaled the return of Ms. Bagshot.

Their esteemed host paid them no more attention than a milky stare, making her hobbling way to the stairs, which creaked under her weight as she mounted the first step. Turning, she pointed at Harry and gestured to follow again. As the three took a collective step forward, she frowned, and held up a hand in a 'stop' gesture. Extending her arm, index finger very pointedly aimed at Harry, she crooked it. At the gesture, Harry felt a horrible, repulsive jolt of _something_ from the Horcrux resting against his chest. The sensation was all too familiar after weeks of wearing it, the shorn piece of Voldemort's soul occasionally exerting extra effort against the bearer, but this time, it somehow felt different. He would almost have sworn it surged forward off his breast a fraction of an inch, and the sensation accompanying it could very nearly have been taken as a twisted, perverse glee.

He shook it off, but before he took a step forward, Hermione grabbed his arm and made eye contact. Long practice reading each other's facial expressions came into play as she conveyed with a single glance exactly what she thought about going upstairs alone. What she thought would not be repeatable in polite company. A shrug, a nod of the head towards the woman waiting on the stairs, and a mouthed "What could _she_ do to me?" later, the bushy-haired witch let out a long-suffering exhale and turned her attention back to her new prize.

The upper level of the house was much like the lower, except with marginally less dust and clutter. Bathilda led him into a room just off the head of the stairs. By the dim moonlight that fought its way through a dirty window, he could make out piles of dirty laundry; an analysis that his nose confirmed. With a muttered _Lumos_ , light flooded the room, revealing Ms. Bagshot staring at him intently. "What did you bring me up here for?"

She continued staring, eyes fixed on his scar. "You are Potter?"

"Yes, I am." More staring. "Why did you bring me here?"

She pointed to one of the piles of laundry. As he turned to look, several things happened. Suddenly, he was elsewhere, and a shiver of glee ran through him. A high, cold, voice, his own, but not his own, cried " _Hold him!"_ He came rushing back into his own form. The Horcrux was tugging at his neck, burning, freezing, with an unholy malevolence. Unruly jewelry was the least of his worries. Momentarily frozen in horror, he watched as the body of Bathilda Bagshot fell to the ground, the writhing black mass of a great snake pouring from the void where her neck had been. _Nagini._ Barely had he registered this than the serpent struck. Time slowed as its maw opened, revealing needle-sharp fangs. His arm was in motion attempting to dodge, but he could already tell it would be too little, too late.

" _Depulso!_ " Luna's voice rang out loud and clear in the confined space. Gone was any trace of dreaminess, leaving only the battle-hardened veteran of the Department of Mysteries. The banishment charm impacted Nagini mid-strike, with enough force to send a human flying. The fell magics on Voldemort's familiar protected her from most of the impact, but not all. The force which slipped through her shielding knocked her sideways, such that her strike knocked Harry's wand from his hand, rather than latching onto his wrist. The _Lumos_ charm failed as yew clattered on musty oak, leaving the room in near-total darkness.

" _Confringo!"_ The blasting curse flew from Hermione's outstretched wand, ricocheting off Nagini's magic-resistant hide. Instinctively, Harry shielded his eyes, just before the explosion lit up the room like a supernova. Moonlight flooded in through the newly-made hole in the wall. The snake slithered out of the rubble with an irritated hiss, coiling herself to strike again. "Run, Harry!" came Hermione's shout. He started, slipped, and fell, his foot skidding on something thin and pencil-like - his wand! Fumbling on the rough boards for eternal moments, sinister hissing in his ears, his hand found purchase on the length of wood amidst the rubble. Holding onto it like a drowning man clutching a straw, he scrambled to his feet and fled, Hermione and Luna close behind him. His feet had barely touched the filthy carpet before the stairway groaned, listed, and collapsed as the witches shouted another barrage of spells.

His knees nearly buckled, searing pain coursing through his scar. Pain like that could only mean one thing. "He's coming! _Hermione, Luna, he's coming!_ " he cried. Without hesitation, both witches grabbed an arm - and then they were off, twisting, turning, squeezing through the wrinkles in the fabric of reality. Light flooded their vision as they came back into being in their campsite - three feet above the forest floor. They landed in a tangled pile in the leaves, where they laid, groaning.

"Maybe a little more Destination next time," Hermione gasped.

"I was just a tiny bit distracted," Harry began, before molten fire flooded into his scar like a torrent. He was in the forest, screaming in agony, two frantic witches bending over him; he was standing outside Bathilda's cottage, screaming his rage to the heavens, frustration overflowing in curses from his wand, so close to the site where he had nearly lost everything, so close to final victory, only to fail again...

 _Two children dressed as pumpkins waddling across the rain-slicked cobblestones of the square, the shop window covered in paper spiders; all the tawdry Muggle trappings of a world in which they did not believe… He was gliding along, that sense of purpose and power and rightness in him that he always knew on these occasions... Not anger, that was for weaker souls than he… but triumph, yes… Tonight, even prophecy would confirm his reign..._

" _Nice costume, mister!"_

 _He saw the small boy's smile falter as he ran near enough to see beneath the hood of the cloak, watched in bemusement as the fear clouded the brat's painted face, fingered the handle of his wand beneath his robes as he fled as fast as his dumpy legs could carry him… One simple movement and the child would never reach his mother… but unnecessary, quite unnecessary. And along a new and darker street he moved, the storm's wind clutching at his cloak. Now his destination was in sight at last, the Fidelius Charm broken, though they did not know it yet. A feather-light touch of amusement flitted over him as he recalled how easily the rat had broken. The Cruciatus had barely touched him before he was begging for mercy. Pathetic. Certainly pathetic, but even fools had their uses._

 _His soft footfalls made less noise than the dead leaves slithering along the pavement as he drew level with the dark hedge, and peered over it. They had not drawn the curtains; he saw them quite clearly in their little sitting room, the tall black-haired man in his glasses, making puffs of colored smoke erupt from his wand for the amusement of the small black-haired boy in his blue pajamas. The child was laughing and trying to catch the smoke, to grab it in his small fist..._

 _A door opened and the mother entered, saying words he could not hear, her long dark-red hair falling over her face. Now the father scooped up the son and handed him to the mother. He threw his wand down upon the sofa and stretched, yawning… The gate creaked in protest as long, bony fingers eased it open, but James Potter did not hear._

 _His white hand pulled out the wand beneath his cloak and pointed it at the door. He paused a moment, savoring the flavor of his impending glory, before unleashing his spell. The door burst open, and he was in motion; a storm, a hurricane, a force of nature, power and grace incarnate, quick as the lightning, but as unhurried as the glacier. He was over the threshold as James came sprinting into the hall. A faint tinge of glee. It was easy, too easy, the fool had not even picked up his wand…_

" _Lily, take Harry and go! It's him! Go! Run! I'll hold him off!"_

 _Hold_ him, _the Dark Lord Voldemort, off, without so much as a wand in his hand? He laughed, a high, thin, cruel, sound, before casting the curse._

" _Avada Kedavra!"_

 _The green light filled the cramped hallway, it lit the table pushed against the wall, it made the banisters glare like lightning rods, and James Potter fell like a marionette whose strings were cut._

 _He could hear her screaming from the upper floor, trapped, but as long as she was sensible, she, at least, had nothing to fear. He would have preferred to kill her as well, but Severus was competent, at least, and the man had begged so hard for her to be spared. As long as the boy died, it couldn't hurt to let her live, he mused. He climbed the steps, listening with faint amusement to her attempts to barricade herself in. Pathetic. She had no wand either. How stupid they were, and how trusting, thinking that their safety lay in friends, that their weapons could be laid aside even for moments..._

 _He forced the door open, casting aside the chair and boxes hastily piled against it with one lazy wave of his wand - and there she stood, the child in her arms._

 _At the sight of him, she dropped her son into the crib behind her and threw her arms wide, as if this would help, as if in shielding him from sight she hoped to be chosen instead…_

" _Not Harry, not Harry, please not Harry!"_

" _Stand aside, you silly girl… stand aside now."_

" _Not Harry, please no, take me, kill me instead—"_

" _This is my last warning—"_

" _Not Harry! Please ...have mercy...have mercy... Not Harry! Not Harry! Please—I'll do anything—"_

" _Stand aside. Stand aside, girl!"_

 _His temper flared. He could have forced her away from the crib, but her cries were grating on his nerves, it seemed more prudent to finish them all… Severus would complain, of course, but what could he do…_

 _The eldritch green lit up the room, the toy broom hanging over the crib, the fibers of the rug, the bars of the crib all casting shadows sharp as knives, and she dropped like her husband._

 _The child had not cried all this time. He was standing, clutching the bars of his crib as he looked up into the intruder's face with a kind of bright interest, perhaps thinking that it was his father who hid beneath the cloak, making more pretty lights, and that his mother would pop up any moment, laughing. He pointed the wand very carefully and deliberately into the boy's face. He wanted to see it happen, to see the absolute destruction of this one, inexplicable danger. The child began to cry. It had seen that he was not James. He did not like it crying, he had never been able to stomach the small ones whining in the orphanage—_

" _Avada Kedavra!"_

 _And then he broke, shattered, ground into dust on the fabric of reality; He was nothing, nothing but pain and terror and cold, everlasting cold, and he must hide himself, not here in the rubble of the ruined house, where the child was trapped and screaming, but far away… far away…_

"No," he moaned.

 _The snake rustled on the filthy, cluttered floor, and he had killed the boy, and yet he was the boy…_

"No…"

 _And now he stood at the broken window of Bathilda's house, immersed in memories of his greatest loss, and at his feet the great snake slithered over broken china and glass… He looked down and saw something… something incredible…_

"No…!"

"Harry, it's alright, you're alright."

 _He stooped down and picked up the smashed photograph. A flash of momentary triumph. There he was, the unknown thief he was seeking…_

"No...I dropped it...I dropped it..."

"Harry, it's okay, wake up, wake up!"

He was Harry… Harry, not Voldemort… and the thing that was rustling was not a snake… He opened his eyes, and immediately regretted the decision; the soft light from a bluebell flame lancing into his retinas. Groaning, he lifted a hand to his temple. His cranium felt like several poltergeists had taken up residence, and were throwing things about with an unholy zeal. His chest hurt, his back ached, and his knuckles were sore, to boot.

Screwing up his Gryffindor courage, he cracked an eyelid again. This time, the terrible intensity of the light was muted. Emerald green opened further, and with a - very gingerly - turning of his head, he beheld two worried faces, conveniently blocking the bulk of the light. For just a fraction of a second, through his mental haze, Luna's blonde hair, the warm hues of lamplight reflecting off it, was Weasley red, and Ron had returned, but as his eyes focused more, that delusion was put to flight. Even with his glasses missing, Luna's face had little in common with Ron's. Hermione slipped his glasses onto his face, bringing the underside of the bunk and the heads of the witches into clear focus. He tried to move briefly, and instantly halted the action. Settling onto his back, he gave an enormous groan, as he found his previous analysis was wrong: _everything_ hurt.

"Harry, are you alright?" came a worried voice.

"M'fine," he mumbled. "How long?"

"All night, Harry, it's seven in the morning now," came Hermione's voice. Slowly, very carefully, he propped himself up on an elbow, and took in her face. She was chewing gently on her bottom lip, and appeared to be barely holding back tears. "You collapsed right after we apparated back, grabbing at your scar. Luna had to stun you so we could help, you were spasming so hard we thought you might have sprained your back. You've been tossing and turning all night, shouting, moaning things…" She trailed off. "The Horcrux was stuck to your chest, we had to use a severing charm to get it off you. I think it's going to scar." Pulling up his shirt, he stared at the oval burn mark over his heart.

"Where is it now?"

"In my bag, I thought it would be best to keep it off for a while."

Nodding, and promptly cursing himself for his foolishness, Harry sat up. The motion felt… wrong, somehow. Patting his pockets, he noticed a conspicuous absence: his wand. "Where's my wand?" Hermione's only response was to look at him, tears starting to break through her self-control. "Where's my wand, Hermione?" he repeated, in frustration.

"Harry…"

" _Where is my wand?_ "

Wordlessly, she picked it up and handed it to him. The wood was scorched and splintered, a large crack in the middle revealing a hint of the fiery feather at its core. Numbly, he took it, cradling it like a living being. He couldn't think, a blur of panic consuming him. Hermione's cheeks were streaked with silently shed tears now. "Harry… I think I cracked it… There are scorch marks on it, and I'm the only one that cast an explosive spell while your wand was on the ground…"

"It was an accident… we'll find a way to repair it…" Harry sounded entirely unconvincing.

A gentle cough interrupted them. "Excuse me, I've been terribly patient, but I'm getting quite curious. What, exactly, is this Horcrux?" Harry and Hermione shared a quick glance. They'd forgotten that Luna didn't know the terrible lengths Voldemort had gone to in his quest to cheat death.

"Dumbledore said not to tell anyone…"

"She already knows that they exist, she'd figure it out eventually," Harry chided. "I trust her."

Hermione looked pensive for a moment, obviously conflicted between her loyalty to Dumbledore and her trust in her best friend. Trust won out. Drying her eyes with her sleeve, she turned back to Luna. "As you know, when You-Know-Who died in 1981, he didn't really die. That locket is one of the reasons why. He performed dark rituals, including the murder of an innocent in cold blood, to split his soul into fragments, and bind them into artifacts like that. So when he died on that night, he didn't… pass on. The Horcruxes tethered his soul to this life. As long as they exist, he can never truly be killed."

Luna's normally imperturbable face was a mask of unabashed horror. "How many are there?"

Harry's expression was grim. "We think he made seven. There was the diary, back in first year, Slytherin's ring, Slytherin's locket, and Nagini. We think he made Hufflepuff's Cup, and two others artifacts of the other founders, into Horcruxes as well."

"How long have you had the locket?"

"Several months. We've been taking turns wearing it, to make sure it's safe. It feels horrible to wear it, but we can't risk losing it."

"You've been wearing a piece of You-Know-Who's soul for months?" The blonde's eyes flashed dangerously before she schooled her features into a more normal expression, with obvious effort. Reaching into the pocket of her robes, she pulled out a battered pair of Spectrespecs, and proceeded to look them over from head to toe. "I can barely see your faces for the Wrackspurts, that's not good at all." Placing the strange glasses back in her robes, she pulled the Horcrux from Hermione's bag, ignoring her protests, and began casting spells on it. A red glow encompassed the locket at her ministrations. "Oh, dear. There seems to be a hive of Wrackspurts in this locket, and I doubt you have time to make some siphons. They should go away if you stop wearing it, they don't like to be far from their hive." She pulled a cloth from the bag, wrapped the locket in it, and consigned the locket to the beaded lips of the abyss. At the sight of the cloth, Hermione's fragile control shattered, and she burst back into tears. It was one of Ron's shirts.

Harry's patience, worn low by months of near-constant stress, finally snapped. "Will you _stop that?!_ " he barked. "The git left weeks ago, your blubbering isn't going to bring the wanker back!"

Hermione looked up angrily. "How can you say that about him? He's your best friend!"

"He left us to face You-Know-Who alone! He took any right to call himself my friend with him when he walked out that door!"

"So all the times he's helped us don't count for anything?"

"What has he done for us? Let's think about it. Playing a giant chess set? Getting trapped with Flophart in the Chamber? All but abandoning me during the Triwizard? Or maybe you'd like to look more recently. Let's see… Eating all our food on the hunt, moping about how little progress we were making? I would have forgiven him for all of that! But for leaving us when we needed him most?"

"He was under a lot of stress, it's understandable," Hermione began.

"No, it bloody well isn't! You were under just as much stress as him, if not more, but did you leave? And what about since then? I almost got bitten by bloody Nagini, we barely got away from the Dark Lord himself, and you're telling me it was stressful before?"

Hermione went to fire off an angry retort, but found herself unable to speak. Temper high, she rounded on Luna, prepared to tear into the younger witch, only to stop when she saw Luna. The dreamy expression was gone. She was leaning forward in her chair earnestly, wand pointed at the two. "Harry Potter and Hermione Granger, you are both right, and you are both wrong." Lowering her wand, she continued. "This," she gestured to them, "is not you. Harry, Hermione has been by your side since the beginning. She cares deeply about you, and you care deeply about her. Would you, in your right mind, be ripping into her that violently? Hermione, some call you the brightest witch of the age. Have you thought once about why Harry might not be ready to forgive Ron? Wearing that horrible _thing_ for months has to have affected you both in some way." Cancelling the silencing charm with a wave of her wand, Luna stood. "Harry, please come with me," she ordered, already on her way out of the tent. Her tone brooked no arguments.

Outside, she began before Harry could voice the angry protest already forming on his lips. "Harry, please listen to me. You don't have to agree with me, but give me a chance to speak before you judge." Grudgingly, he nodded his assent, and she continued, "Hermione is more willing to forgive wrongs than you, a trait which you should be quite glad for, as otherwise all those essays you and Ron made her check, the times you didn't ask what she wanted to do, all those little wrongs, would pile up in her soul, just like Ron's mistakes have done in yours. She doesn't understand why his abandonment grates on you so much, either. She grew up with two parents who were always there. It is physically impossible for her to feel the same way as you about family, and from that, how strongly you feel about people who betray that sense of family."

She took a breath before continuing. "How many people do you think she would call her friend?"

"Me, Ron, You, Neville, maybe Ginny…" He trailed off, blinking in realization.

"From the few conversations I've had with her, I would be surprised if the number of friends she had in her entire life before Hogwarts was more than that number. Did you stop to think about how she would feel when one of those friends, one of her two closest friends, rejected her?"

His head slumped, the indignant fire in his posture gone. "No," he whispered.

"She didn't deserve any of that outburst, Harry Potter. She was with you on every misadventure; she may not have liked what you were doing, but she would help you with it regardless. Every time you got sent to the infirmary, Madam Pomfrey had to all but physically remove her from your side so she would go to her classes." The blonde shook her head. "I need to go talk to her. Think about what I said."

The tent flap closed behind her with the soft swish of canvas on canvas, and Harry slumped to the ground with a huge sigh, resting his back against a tree and cradling his still-pounding head in his hands. Oh, how he wished to be "Just Harry" sometimes.

o-/== IIII ==\\-o

As Harry disappeared through the tent door, Hermione unsteadily got to her feet and made the short journey to the bed. She collapsed, curling up in the fetal position in the middle and sobbing out her frustration. Long minutes passed and the tears flowed unchecked, despite her efforts to calm herself. Dimly, she registered the approach of another presence, and tried again to stem the tide, failing miserably. As a weight settled by her head, she attempted to say something, her only result an inarticulate mumble of tear-choked sound. "Shh… It's okay…" Luna cooed, gently combing slender fingers through the older witch's bushy locks. At the words, Hermione renounced her feeble attempts to restrain herself, and began weeping uncontrollably.

All tears eventually dry, and Hermione's were no different. As she began to take in her surroundings again, she realized her head was in Luna's lap, and the blonde was still absently raking her fingers through her now significantly less bushy hair. The hand stilled, as Luna sensed her stirring. "Are you okay?" she asked, gently.

Hermione gave a hesitant nod. "I will be. Thank you, Luna, I needed that…"

"If it's okay with you, I'll go get Harry while you freshen up? I think you two will both have some things to say to each other."

o-/== IIII ==\\-o

Crisp air and bright sunshine greeted Luna as she pushed through the tent flap. Shielding her eyes, she scanned for the familiar shock of black hair against the grey-brown of the leaves. There - barely peeking out from behind a tree, by the brook. He turned to regard her as she approached, cracking a wry smile. "Hey. Back for round two?"

"Round two should be between you and Hermione, don't you think?"

He sighed, running a hand through his unruly hair. "Yeah, I suppose I owe it to her." He hefted himself to his feet, brushing off leaves. "I'll just have to hope she won't hex an unarmed man," he joked feebly.

o-/== IIII ==\\-o

Hermione leapt to her feet on their arrival back in the tent.

"Harry…" she appeared to want to launch one of her signature bone-breaking hugs, but held back, as if scared that Harry might reject her. Noticing this, he opened his arms towards her. A brunette cruise missile streaked across the tent into his chest, Harry returning the hug in kind.

"I'm sorry," they both began, then blushed. Harry recovered first. "Hermione, I'm so sorry, you didn't deserve any of that. We may have differing opinions on Ron now, but I should have been willing to talk them out without yelling. Can you forgive me?"

"Absolutely. I'm sorry too, Harry, I should have thought about why you would feel that way instead of blowing up on you. Can you forgive me?"

He tightened the hug in response. They stood there for a few minutes, silently healing each other's wounds, before they remembered the other presence in the tent. Luna stood a few feet away, watching them with a satisfied expression. With a shared glance, they made a decision. Breaking their hug, they reformed a few feet away, with a surprised Luna in the middle. "Thank you, Luna," Harry whispered in her ear. "That would have gotten pretty bad without you," Hermione added. A wide smile bloomed on the blonde's face as she returned the hug, nuzzling into Harry on her front. Several seconds passed, then:

"Hermione, your hand must have been cold, it seems to be seeking warmth inside my shirt," Luna calmly announced. The older witch jerked her hand from under the fabric, blushing furiously and stuttering apologies, prompting a frown from Luna. "I didn't mind, I was going to inquire if you wanted me to put it someplace warmer." At the sight of Hermione's face, now red enough to give the famous Weasley hair a run for its money, Harry lost control and burst into peals of laughter. As the waves of mirth washed over her, Hermione glared indignantly at Harry. She held it for a full three seconds, before joining in.

"Oh, I'm going to get you for that one, Luna Lovegood," she growled, launching a full-scale tickling assault on the giggling younger witch. Harry performed a strategic withdrawal to avoid being caught in the crossfire; extracting himself from the melee as the two women rolled around on the tent floor, laughing hysterically. The bemused wizard shook his head, grinning in disbelief at the fact that they had been yelling furiously at each other only minutes earlier. Luna's ability to defuse a situation was a magical force in and of itself. The laughter settled, and the two stood up, with Hermione offering Luna a helping hand. It was then that they noticed Harry's absence from their brief skirmish. The predatory glint in their eyes sparked a primal instinct deep within his psyche, and he bolted for the tent door. He had barely made it ten feet before Luna commenced hostilities with a tickling jinx. The war was short.

As Hermione had him pinned to the floor, negotiating the terms of his surrender, soft music flooded the tent. Looking up in surprise, they saw Luna by the Wizarding Wireless, eyes closed, slowly swaying to the music. She sensed them staring after a few seconds, and opened her eyes to regard them. "I don't have too many memories of my mother," she began, "but one of the things I do remember is that whenever she and my father would have an argument, whenever they made up, they would dance together. I've always thought it was a beautiful idea."

Hermione relinquished her hold on Harry, and, together, they got to their feet. Harry made an exaggerated bow, and offered his hand. "May I have this dance, milady?" Hermione giggled - although she would never admit it - and accepted his hand. The dance began slowly, then, as the music picked up, they let the melody carry them away. They twirled and spun and moved like they were at the Yule Ball, not a tent in the middle of a forest, only hours past an attempt on their lives by the familiar of the Dark Lord himself.

Their dancing slowed with the music, until, as the song faded, they were simply rocking back and forth in each other's arms, Hermione's head against Harry's chest. That Luna had left the tent at some point barely registered as they continued, lost in the moment. The song ended, and they separated slightly, looking into each other's eyes for a poignant moment. Slowly, Hermione leaned her head forward, and planted a chaste kiss on Harry's cheek, before leaning her head into his shoulder. "Thank you, Harry," she murmured.

He placed a gentle kiss on her forehead, feeling it somehow appropriate, before responding. "Thank _you,_ Hermione."

When Luna returned, she found them sitting next to each other on the steps, talking lightly about nothing in particular, music still playing softly. She smiled. It always pained her to see any of her friends at odds with another, especially these two. They looked up as she entered, grinning. "It seems we are ever more in your debt, Lady Lovegood," Harry joked. Standing, he bowed, and offered his hand. "May I have the honor of beginning to repay that debt?"

Outwardly calm, but privately one-footed by disbelief, Luna accepted the hand. Hermione turned up the volume, and they began, laughter soon filling the tent as they too were swept away by the rhythm.

"Happy Christmas, Luna."

"Happy Christmas, Harry."

"Happy Christmas, you two."


End file.
